


hatred grows in empty spaces

by Kierkegarden



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Clone Wars (2003) - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Don't let the tags fool you - this is a Dooku character study, Gen, Loss, No porn/No plot, Parental Love, Physical Abuse, Sith Family Values, Violence, canon compliant to a fault, free form
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-19
Updated: 2018-01-19
Packaged: 2019-03-06 19:22:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,225
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13417977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kierkegarden/pseuds/Kierkegarden
Summary: The most reprehensible thing about Savage Opress is that he will never be Asajj Ventress.orThe entirely self indulgent Count Dooku character study nobody ever asked for.





	hatred grows in empty spaces

**Author's Note:**

> Note: This is not romance so if you are coming for the Kenobi/Ventress, please do not be disheartened by the fact that it is only a one-off mention that I marked in case it is a huge problem for those who dislike the pairing.

Asajj wraps herself in a cloak of shadows, slips into the night, marbles out across the interiors of buildings like dappling of moonlight. Before Dooku comes to know her as his child, he knows that. He knows that she breathes silently in corners of empty rooms and slides into crowds unseen. He knows impressively little else about her when she comes to his side at the gladiator rink at the Cauldron.

Dooku doesn’t find pleasure in watching the fights and he is not repulsed by it. A Sith Lord does not twine at the throws of violence. He also did not come here to converse with a black robed assassin and he will not be bothered to. She is well guarded - some kind of training outside of the Order, some potent and ancient primitive magic. He commends her for it -  _ but no thank you, _ he does not need a spy.

She is much more than that. 

Asajj destroys every petty lifeform in the arena and returns to him.

“I am Sith.”

Dooku laughs, a deep bellowing laugh of recognition. “A bold claim, but you are not Sith.” 

_ She will be, _ Dooku thinks,  _ she will be my apprentice. _

 

Asajj moves between her two lightsabers like a dance, blood through capillaries, purposeful and with grace. She takes her caf with a half shot of moof milk, takes her enemies at the end of an icy gaze and later pressed sizzling against her saber. She doesn’t take friends,  _ not nearly enough, _ Dooku thinks.

Asajj has Sith written in her destiny, Dooku thinks. She has Sith written in her chin tilt, in her careful stride. It’s engraved when her jaw tightens, pressed against red laser against blue - with some Jedi scum pushed against the other side. She even has Sith written in her blood when she fails him.

She emulates him, their paths plaited together across these Sith temple walls, she mimics him - yet, is very much her own. She becomes known, to her credit, as his prized assassin. Asajj possesses subtlety:  _ a gift _ , Dooku thinks, _ that too many lack. _ She possesses the sort of patience that the Jedi claim to value but always seem to fall short on. She possesses perseverance. She fails him again and again.

Her soft breaths do not falter when he tears her apart.

“You must do better for me, my child.”

“I will not fail you again, Lord Tyranus.”

 

Asajj takes praise like she takes criticism. On the other end of the Jedi’s saber, she resists as Kenobi mocks her - calls to her - she calls him back. Her folly. Dooku knows of her attraction to him, her hatred. The way she speaks of him, as a separate entity from the rest of the order - existing - she slowly saws her steak to shreds at dinner, juices pooling on her plate.

“My child, this is power and control. You must do only your duty to eliminate him as you would any other Jedi.”

“He infuriates me,” Her eyes gleam, pools of amber ensnaring anything small and brave enough to fall under her gaze. Dooku is neither small nor brave. He is grand and wise enough to know the bravery of most is merely hubris.

“You must not let him differentiate himself from the others.”

“He is different,” Asajj hisses, “He gets away.”

“He and  _ Skywalker,”  _ she adds a moment later, a jealous, angry hiss.

Skywalker - perhaps - is different. No amount of Shields could fully block the turmoil within him. Kenobi is merely a Jedi Master, like any other. Dooku does not understand.

“You must do better, my apprentice,” he slowly feeds himself a neatly cut bite, “the first steps towards the dark side are fear and anger - love and possession. You have traveled down this road long enough to know that there is only one thing that matters. _ Power through your passion _ . Regain it.”

 

Asajj has grown past Kenobi, will soon grow past Tyranus on this road, will grow past Sidious but Dooku is not afraid of her. She respects him still, still clings to the semblance of purpose he gives her. He is something she hadn’t known for many years before coming to him: direction. Reason. Responsibility. Power. 

She gives him a conduit for a legacy that he believes he may have on the world someday.

It’s the perfect symbiotic relationship of power gaining,  _ power gaining _ and no power seeps away, a back-and-forth exchange of unlimited power and Sidious sees it. He hears about the assassinations at her hand. He hears the way they talk to each other -   _ fidelity, confidant, my child.  _ He knows he is being replaced.

There is no blueprint set forth for the destruction of the most powerful Sith Lord in the galaxy but he is well aware that there can only be two - he’s well aware of the pact between them. Sidious doesn’t play Dejarik - he skews the board and bets.

Tyranus’s Master senses a Disturbance in the Force - one piece out of line on this board he’s been watching fervently, from whatever tower he watches from. He will have the piece beat out of combat. He will have Asajj Ventress destroyed. Dooku must comply.

She must be no different than any other.  _ His child. _

“You are no longer my apprentice.”

The betrayal lines her face - poisonous hate - smudges every promise of Sith in her blood.

 

Savage Opress is not subtle. Savage Opress is not slippery. Savage Opress does not dance with a saber like a shadow dances with the end of a long day. Dooku does not know how Savage takes his caf and does not particularly care.

Savage was not supposed to be different, but he is to Dooku. No more different than anyone would be, he admits, anyone who stampedes into the burrow Asajj Ventress made within his heart. The Nightsister leader promised him a powerful apprentice - and that Savage is - but Dooku  _ feels _ . He  _ feels _ like when he was a Jedi, he  _ feels  _ his own Fall, and his own failure. Lips tightening over hyper-aware teeth, a bodily sensation, a grounding consciousness, Dooku feels.

Savage plows Republic lives like an Armored Assault Tank. Savage destroys carelessly, grunts and murmurs loudly, gracelessly.

Dooku shocks him gracelessly back, Force lightning coursing angrily through his fingertips, Dooku tortures the Dathomirian, because he will never be her. He feels wicked pleasure as he watches Savage’s face contort - his greatest offense to the world being that he is a replacement. A obstacle in the space where she used to be.

She would have taken his life someday. Dooku doesn’t care.

“Why do you hate me?” Savage grunts out in pain, muscles tensed, convulsing.

Dooku stares down the bridge of his nose.

“I do not hate you, my new apprentice. This is the way in which your power will grow.”

Another shock and Savage shudders like an earthquake. Dooku relishes his agony, greedily drinking up his suffering. Asajj Ventress had potential energy in her blood and Savage Opress has submission.

“I...hate...you,” the crumpled mass manages.

“Good. You will be a suitable replacement.”

The ground is covered with filth and ghosts here and something lingers within the Force, a darkness that is blacker than the dark side. Dooku feels his stomach twist around it, something intimate and possessive, dangerous and powerful.

 

_ She was my child, _ Dooku thinks.

_ I lost her _ , Dooku thinks.

 


End file.
